Kumar Ramanathan, PhD
Bridge to Faculty Scholar
Political Science
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About
Kumar Ramanathan is a Bridge to Faculty Scholar in the Department of Political Science at UIC. He earned his Ph.D. in political science at Northwestern University, and previously held positions as a Doctoral Fellow at the American Bar Foundation and Postdoctoral Scholar at the University of Chicago.
His research explores how the politics of law and public policy shape inequality in the United States. This includes projects on civil rights and social welfare policies, urban politics, immigrant politics, and democratic accountability. His work has been published in Urban Affairs Review, the Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics, Studies in American Political Development, and Political Research Quarterly.
His book manuscript, tentatively titled Building a Civil Rights Agenda: The Democratic Party and the Origins of Racial Liberalism, explores how party politics during the 1930s-60s shaped the content of landmark civil rights legislation. The dissertation on which the book manuscript is based received an honorable mention from the American Political Science Association’s Politics and History Section.
His research on urban politics focuses on Chicago, including projects on the changing dynamics of factional conflict in the Chicago City Council and the politics of gentrifying neighborhoods.
Education
PhD in Political Science, Northwestern University, 2023
MA in Political Science, Northwestern University, 2018
BA in Philosophy and Political Science, Tufts University, 2015
Professional Memberships
American Political Science Association (APSA)
Midwest Political Science Association (MPSA)
Social Science History Association (SSHA)
Law and Society Association (LSA)